Page 96 of The Girlfriend Agreement (Conwick U #1)

My eyes lock on the black folder clutched in his hand—or rather, on the title page peeking through the transparent cover sleeve—and I have to will myself to believe what I’m seeing.

It’s the proposal. My proposal. But how?

Blondie and I haven’t even finished compiling all the data we need to complete it, so how the hell is it here?

And with my dad ? Not to mention like this —like a real, honest-to-god, professional document that someone like my eternally unimpressed father might actually take seriously?

I’m lost for words. Blondie did this. She not only organized all our research, but she printed it, bound it, and undoubtedly went beyond the limits of her comfort zone to present it to my parents. For me . To fight when I couldn’t find the strength or courage to fight for myself.

My eyes burn as my father sets the folder on the table before him, but he doesn’t move to open it. He just gingerly places his palms flat on top of the cover and stares down at the backs of his hands, his usually stern expression unreadable.

His voice is quiet when he continues. “I spent the afternoon combing through this after she left yesterday, and I have to say…” He pauses, drawing in a deep breath. “This is tremendous, hijo.”

I blink, momentarily lost for words. At first, all I’m aware of is the fact that he just called me hijo again.

That endearment, that familiarity, was so notably lacking in our previous conversation, and hearing it again eases some of that fear, that anxiety, that’s been eating away at me these last few days.

But then something else grabs my attention, and my focus becomes singular—wholly consumed by one particular thing he just said. Something far more surprising.

My dad just complimented me.

“You…read my proposal?” I manage past the lump of shock in my throat.

Meeting my gaze, Dad gives me a small, solemn nod. “I did.”

“We both did,” Mom adds before reaching across the table to take my hand.

As her fingers wrap around mine, her eyes shine with an emotion I don’t recognize, and for a moment, I wonder if I’m being trolled.

Or if I’ve somehow stepped into an alternate timeline where a benevolent alien race has abducted my parents and replaced them with more emotionally available doppelg?ngers. “And it’s a great idea, Damian.”

“The last few years, all we wanted was to see some initiative from you, but this?” A startled grunt escapes me when Dad lifts one hand and claps it against my back. “When you begin at Hallazgo this summer, I want you leading the team that?—”

“Wait,” I interrupt, needing a second to process. I tug my hand out from under my mother’s, and lean away from my father’s touch, casting a wary glance between them, uncertain. “You still want me to come work for Hallazgo? I’m not…cut off?”

Mom’s face instantly crumples at the strained vulnerability in my voice. “No. No , forget the ultimatum. Forget the vote,” she says to me, her tone thick with tears. “That was a mistake?—”

“We don’t want to lose another son.”

I stiffen at my father’s gruff baritone, my eyes moving in a sluggish crawl as they shift back to his, my reactions slowed by the lightning strike of shock jolting through me. Beside me, my mother is equally still.

Dad’s gaze is unwavering, and I register the slight bob of his Adam’s apple as he rasps, “We don’t want to lose you , hijo.”

All the emotions I’ve bottled up these last four years threaten to spill out at his words. This is so fucked up. I feel like I’m living in Upside Down Land where the ground is above me, and I’m standing on nothing but sky, free-falling into an endless abyss.

They don’t want to lose me? After everything, what new mindfuckery is this?

I let out a derisive snort as I gesture to the dining room around me. “Then why ask me to meet you here of all places?” Frustration hitches my tone up an octave.

Out of the corner of my eye, I catch Mom shaking her head.

“What are you talking about?” she asks.

I round on her, scowling. “You two only ever ask me to meet you here when you have bad news. Wednesday’s fun little hoedown at home being the one recent exception.” I scoff.

Her mouth pops open as she brings a hand to her chest and clutches the string of pearls around her neck. “Have we really done that?” she whispers, aghast.

I’m about to answer her when my father chokes out a humorless laugh.

“I suppose we have.” When I turn to look at him again, his head is lowered, propped up by his hand, his fingers pressing into his eyelids.

“Truthfully, I’ve always chosen this place for the difficult conversations because I used to come here with your abuelo.

Being here helps me feel closer to him. And I needed that support to know how to be a good father to you.

” He looks up at me then, his expression miserable. “Something I have clearly failed at.”

I…don’t know what to say. That is the most self-aware thing my father has ever admitted out loud—at least to me.

Straightening, he clears his throat again.

“Miss Dornan enlightened us about a few things that we were unaware—” He winces, shakes his head, then quickly says, “No, that we were willfully ignoring. I don’t blame you for being angry with me.

I’m angry with me, hijo. Not just for what happened to Jamie, but for disregarding what you obviously needed in the aftermath. ”

My chest seems to cave in around my heart, crushing it. This isn’t like him. We don’t talk about this. We don’t talk about Jamie. We don’t ever talk about what happened.

But then…that was always the problem.

“That choice…” It’s only when he sniffs that I notice the sheen of tears in his eyes.

“The guilt that’s followed me since is something I’ll live with every day for the rest of my life, but what I can’t live with is knowing that I have failed both my children.

” My eyes widen as he turns in his chair to face me, his hands clenched into trembling fists in his lap.

“It was foolish of me—of both of us,” he adds with a nod toward my mother, “to think that if we never talked about Jamie then, somehow, our grief would just go away. It was foolish of me not to see how much you were hurting, for focusing on what you were doing and not the why behind it. For not seeing that you were acting out from a place of pain. And for that, I’m so incredibly sorry. ”

Tears burn mercilessly at the corners of my eyes and at the back of my throat. I don’t dare to speak. One word and I know the floodgate will break.

“I’m not a perfect man,” Dad whispers now, his voice barely audible, “but I want to be a better one. I want to be a better father. I don’t want this rift between us to be irreconcilable.

I know I can be stubborn, but I’m not above owning my mistakes.

And it would be a mistake not to tell you how proud I am of you.

Of this .” He raises his left hand and rests it on the table again, on top of my proposal.

“If your abuelo was here…he’d be so proud of you, too, Damian. ”

Proud. That’s a word I never thought I’d hear out of my father’s mouth—not in relation to me, anyway. And even though I realize now it’s something I’ve wanted him to say for far longer than I’m even aware of, and it’s totally not the appropriate response to this situation, I snort.

“Wow, Lexi must’ve really gotten to you,” I say because years of unresolved grief and a penchant for sarcasm have both completely warped my knee-jerk reactions.

To my immense bemusement, my dad’s face splits into a grin. “She’s a very impressive young woman. I can see why you like her.”

I more than like her, I think, but I don’t tell him that. It’s not for my parents to hear. Not yet. Not before I muster up the nerve to tell Blondie.

On my other side, my mother gently nudges my shoulder.

“Perhaps you could convince her to come work at Hallazgo,” she says with a coy smile, and when I catch my father nodding at her, I know this isn’t just some off-the-cuff suggestion, but something they have both seriously talked about and considered. “With a mind like that, she’d be a real asset.”

I stare at each of them in turn, my eyes swinging back and forth between their expectant faces like a pendulum.

Blondie…come work at Hallazgo? With me? Not that I haven’t fantasized about that—about spending our days together.

About what our future would look like. But this?

Even this is beyond my wildest fantasies.

What is even happening? These people can’t be my parents.

Seriously…doppelg?ngers. They have to be.

“Lexi still has two years left at Conwick,” is all I can think to say, and just like that, the dream fizzles away. “There’s no way she could come work at Hallazgo right now.”

My father shrugs. “If it won’t interfere with her studies or scholarship requirements, she can always come on board part-time as a private consultant to help implement the program until she graduates, after which time we can offer her a full-time position.”

I gape at him, my mouth hanging slightly ajar. “A private consultant? Seriously?”

“Just a few hours a week to go over the numbers with the rest of the team, ensure everything is in order,” he explains, as casually as if we’re discussing what to have for lunch.

“And under our specialized contract for high-level consultants, she would be eligible for certain benefits in exchange for her expertise, such as stock options…and access to Hallazgo’s health insurance plan. ”

His words strike me like a fist to my sternum, and I push out a loud, whooshing breath. Is he saying what I think he’s saying?